Cancer care center will open in 2019

Bill Hand BillHandNBSJ

Wednesday

Oct 17, 2018 at 2:04 PMOct 17, 2018 at 2:04 PM

In case you haven’t noticed that large structure going up on the west end of the campus, CarolinaEast is about to open up a new cancer center that can compete with just about any hospital in the state.

And it’s coming soon – as in doors open and patients being diagnosed and treated by May of 2019.

“We’re moving forward,” project engineer John Tomasic said. “We’re framing walls throughout the first and second floors. The third floor is probably farthest along.”

The new construction – both in a new building and revamping of the current radiation oncology building – will cover 110,000 square feet, bringing the area’s diagnostic and cancer care onto the same campus (the diagnostic center currently operates on McCarthy Boulevard).

It will greatly enlarge the hospital’s ability to treat cancer patients while keeping them from having to travel to Chapel Hill for many treatments; it will also provide “defragmentation” of the health system’s cancer treatment, public relations director Megan McGarvey said, as many of the hospital’s current treatment centers are spread to different locations around the city.

Tomasic and Dawn Peel, executive director of the cancer center gave the Sun Journal a tour of the center, showing the work in progress and describing what it will become.

Right now it is an orderly array of girders and metal framing, dusty concrete floors showing the footprints of dozens of hard hatted workers busily doing their thing.

The main building is circular in form, looking something like a giant whistle on its side if you see it from the air. There are three floors: the first floor will be the radiation/oncology floor; the second will house hematology and medical infusion – that is, chemotherapy; the third will house administration and include a classroom and meeting rooms.

The total project will cost $56 million, according to McGarvey. She said that $10.3 million has been raised from about 30 people and organizations. “The cancer center is truly a collaboration,” she said. “The State Employees’ Credit Union actually gifted $3.5 million for the naming rights,” while John and Reba Alyward – for whom the diagnostic center is named – contributed $1.5 million.

The new radiation oncology clinic will include eight exam rooms and separate changing rooms for men and women. Two Varian Cliniac linear accelerators will be used to provide pinpoint radiation.

It will also include an infusion suite with six semi-private infusion bays and two private infusion rooms and a specialty pharmacy. It will sell common basic oncology pharmacy medications as part of its duties.

An image center boutique will also be included, selling oncology-related supplies such as shower shirts, bras and wigs.

A teaching kitchen will be set up to teach patients how to prepare more healthy, appropriate meals, and a café to purchase snacks. A chapel will also be available along with community rooms and support group session rooms.

The second flood will include 12 exam rooms and three procedure rooms.

The large infusion suite will include wall-to-ceiling windows and the view of a healing garden that patients and their families can also stroll. “They can look down and see some greenery and something other than a hospital environment,” Dan MacDonald, director of facility design, said.

According to a CarolinaEast fact sheet, the center first came about in 2014 when CarolinaEast and UNC Cancer Care in Chapel Hill announced a collaboration to bring comprehensive cancer care the area – a level of care that could previously only be gotten by traveling to the Triangle region.

The two hospitals are working together on the project. “We collaborate routinely,” Peele said. “We’re independent, but we’re in a strategic partnership for cancer care.”

“It is the mission of the Cancer Center, in partnership with UNC Cancer Care, to provide comprehensive caner care and prevention for individuals in Craven, Jones, and Pamlico counties, as well as the surrounding area,” the fact sheet notes.

It then goes on to list statistics to illustrate the need:

• More than 770 new cancers occur in Craven, Jones and Pamlico each year. If you throw in Lenoir, Carteret, Onslow and Beaufort, more than 2,600 new cancers occur.

• Breast cancer is one of the leading cancers to occur in the area, joining lung and prostate cancer as the top three that develop here.

• The top ten counties for overall incident rates in North Carolina are all in this region wit Pamlico coming in at number 6, Onslow at 7 and Lenoir at 10. All the local counties except Pitt are above both the state and national average for cancer incidence.

• Pamlico County has the number one incidence rate for lung cancer in the state with Onslow County coming in at number 12.

• Pamlico is also high (number 5) for breast cancer incidence, with Pamlico, Onslow, Lenoir, Craven and Carteret also being above the national incidence rates.

The hospital currently averages 700 radiation treatment visits a month, with 40 new patients starting radiation each month. Approximately 3,000 infusions are done a year, of which 30 percent are blood transfusions.

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